The Secret
by Complicity
Summary: In the lead up to the birth Jac is flooded with irrational hormones and desperate for some breathing space, which the father of her child seems determined to withhold.
1. Chapter 1

**The Secret.**

**A/N. Good Morning. This is just a little (rather unseasonal!) 2 parter for y'all. It was fun to write so I hope you enjoy it, next bit in a couple of days. XX**

**Part 1.**

_The summer had been long, and hot, and punctuated by confusing fluctuations in her body. The autumn brings her comfort, and clothing to hide behind, and a newly found equilibrium within herself. Then with winter comes the cold, and the red noses, and the ever ballooning abdomen. With winter comes the stirring of the secret that turns her core to ice._

_There's a whole ocean of things that nobody else knows about. A yarn that she'll never unravel, and no sentimental relative to do it for her. There are happy memories and sad ones. Memories that make her laugh aloud in solitude, and ones that hurt to stumble over. Some memories are so dark that she's banished them away to a place she's no longer sure how to access. Now, though, she has a confidante. She has her baby; Her bump, with whom she shares everything from the tears in the shower to the endorphin rush from a bar of chocolate. All that has been locked away is opened up a little, now that even her solitude has company. Even the words that will never cross her tongue are no longer only hers._

_The crack is a horrifying, hollow sort of sound that stills the atmosphere and momentarily halts the passing of time. She looks down and sees it beneath her feet, a clean line in the ice that crosses under her left shoe. Nobody moves. She slides her toe ever so slightly away from it, gingerly shifting her weight from one foot to another. For the next bit her eyes are closed and her breath stilted, as if she already knows it's coming. She doesn't see the lake surface shatter, nor does she register that she's falling. The first sensation is one of weightlessness, elation, before the cold engulfs her body and sucks away her ability to think at all. It's suffocating and gasping all at once. The icy water rips at her skin and paralyses her struggle whilst the rest of her, the instinct, causes the frantic splashing that she's only aware of because she can hear it. She doesn't know which way is up. Her flailing limbs reach out but collide with nothing. She needs air. She needs to breathe. Somebody's telling her to breathe._

**ooooo**

Jac leaps from one reality to another. Leaps up, almost right off the bed, her eyes wild and her lungs screaming out for the air that she takes in huge gulps, chokes, hiccups. She blinks a few times, so that the inky black of her bedroom morphs into grey, and familiar objects reveal themselves around the room. She places a hand over her racing heart and finds herself drenched in sweat, her skin greasy with it. She shivers. The ice is internal, emanating from her core, and she gathers the duvet more closely around herself then jumps all over again as the door to the bedroom flies open. It practically slaps back on its hinges and reveals the horrified face of the annoying nurse who's taken up permanent residence on her sofa.

"Bloody hell, Jonny!"

"You screamed!" He bounds across the room and sits on the bed, drawing his face up suffocatingly close to hers and placing one hand on her enlarged stomach. From this proximity she can feel his heartbeat and it's racing even faster than hers.

"No, I didn't." She's indignant, squirming away from him.

"Yes you did." He's ratty, he always is at this hour. "Sounded like you were being... Murdered or something." He gesticulates dramatically and she rolls her eyes at him.

"Sorry Taggart, still in one piece."

"Not funny. Jesus." He starts taking her pulse, feels her forehead, and she shakes him away firmly. The baby gives her a sharp kick to the diaphragm and she grunts in discomfort. She's being scolded for causing a disturbance by both Jonny and foetus simultaneously, and it does nothing for her mood. "What was that?" He snaps. "Pain? What should I do?"

"Kick, you idiot. Go to bed."

"Pain here?" He puts a hand back on the top of her bump and she practically growls under her breath. "I should take your blood pressure."

"It was a kick!" Jac exclaims, shifting onto her side as it happens again. Then, "Just, do something useful and get me a glass of water." He vanishes obediently and she heaves herself up in his wake, pressing her bedroom door firmly shut and twisting the lock. True to form, he's unimpressed when he returns moments later and finds himself banished.

"Very funny, open the door."

"Go to bed." She speaks slowly, mock patronising, and he pauses for just long enough that she dares to hope he's left her in peace.

"Then you'll open the door?"

"What?!" His logic is baffling.

"Just unlock it, Jac!"

"No."

"What if something happens?"

"Something has happened. I've had to barricade myself in my bedroom to get away from a Schizophrenic nutter. For the second time this week, might I add."

"You are such a child. Open it."

"Listen to yourself, why would I open it?"

"Open it, or I'll call the Police!"

"Oh for god's sake. Good. Do it. With any luck they'll take you away and leave me in grave danger of actually getting some sleep." Jonny kicks the door in juvenile frustration, then retreats back to the lumpy bloody sofa to sulk and stare at the ceiling. He hates her. In an instinctive sort of way he cares about her more than he does anybody else in the world. He's sure that's not just about the baby. He loves her. He hates that he loves her. Jac Naylor is a drug. With all of her hard edges, slippery nature and allusive turns of phrase she's impossible to penetrate. She'll evade anything, wriggle from your grip and make herself untouchable. When you do get a grasp on her though, even if only for a moment, you're hooked in for the long game. She'll crawl right into your subconscious and infect every thought and action. She'll make you so angry you could punch drywall until you bleed. He lies on his back as if he's in suspended animation and waits impatiently for sunrise.

**ooooo**

It's morning, and as usual Jac pads into her kitchen to be greeted with the smell of coffee she can't drink and mess she has no energy to clear away. She eyes his greasy toast crumbs with particular distaste as he hands her a glass of orange juice. She can tell before he opens his mouth that he's still smarting from the events of the early hours.

"Can we talk?"

"No." She snaps, wondering how he's still stupid enough to give her the option. "I'll be by the car." My car, she corrects herself internally.

Once outside Jac takes great gulps of icy air, letting the sensation prickle her lungs as if it's proof that she's alive; It's a thought that makes her shiver. It's unnervingly familiar, like there's a piece of information that's just out of reach. She ambles to the quayside, a few metres from the car, and steps right up to the side of it with her toes poking over the edge. She tests the green winter slime that coats the stones with her foot, rubbing absent mindedly at it until it's a wet, shiny surface. She looks down at the water below. The drop must only be a few feet but it looks further, perhaps from the grotesque appearance of the bare harbour wall or the dark hue of the murky water on a cloudy day. It's an opaque black, and she wraps her arms around herself and closes her eyes for a moment, shuddering as she considers how cold it must be, how it'd burn your skin, how you'd writhe in helpless agony. How quickly you'd stop moving at all.

"Jac!" She's dragged from her reverie with a start, and she spins on her heel to face Jonny. He's stalking towards her with a frown emblazoned across his features. There's a flash of something in her head as she turns, and the world spins. It's an image; A splash, a scream in the dead of night that nobody's around to hear. Suddenly she's being pulled forward roughly by the shoulders. He's calling her name again and she shakes herself back to reality. "What the hell were you playing at?"

"Get off me!" She shrugs out of his grasp and stumbles back a little, one foot sliding on the slimy stones. The image is white, blinding, sunlight on frosty grass and reflecting off the ice, burning into unprepared corneas. The image is black, cold and bottomless without direction or guidance. Jonny's hands grab her wrists more forcefully, and he tugs her urgently away from the edge. This time he doesn't let go until he's deposited her onto the bonnet of her car, pushing her into a sitting position by her shoulders.

"You look like shit, I'm calling in." He informs her of this in a low voice as she avoids his scrutinising eyes. He pats down his pockets for his phone then swears again under his breath. "It's upstairs. Come on." She pouts at her shoes and holds her tongue, with no intention of moving from her position on the car. He's already irate so it only takes seconds for him to abandon the idea of cooperation and stalk back up to the flat alone. Jac turns her head to watch him walk away, then takes another deep breath of winter air and looks wistfully out over the dock. She bathes in the calm silence and the soft clinking of unclipped halliards against yacht masts. She lets one of her hands softly rub her bump, which is still sleeping despite the volatile atmosphere and raised voices around it. She ponders the strange feelings that have been surfacing lately, and she frowns. She can't drop her curiosity over the dreams about being plunged into icy water. She tries to rationalize it and analyse it but comes up with nothing each time. It feels so real.

"What's this all about, baby?" She speaks in a soft, humming tone, and her child responds by moving gently underneath her hand. The baby's starting to shift into position for the birth, Jac knows this. It puts a time limit on the pregnancy, and gives her an acute sense of urgency for getting to the bottom of the dreams. She knows that once she's no longer pregnant they'll snuff out, hide away again like forgotten memories, and instinct says she can't let that happen. Suddenly she has a snap of inspiration, and she dives into her handbag for the spare car key she's been hiding from Jonny.

**ooooo**

He could strangle her. In fact, it's probably a good thing that there's no sign of her for dust, because if she was here to witness his fury he's not sure he'd control his actions. He'd been gone five minutes, less even, and in that time she's taken it upon herself to get behind the wheel and vanish on her own when she can barely control her bladder, let alone a vehicle. He's left spinning around the empty parking space, exasperated, with nothing left to kick. Then, he catches a glimpse of something out of the corner of his eye. He dithers for a moment, because she really will kill him when she finds out, but as ever he springs into action on impulse, and puts all thought of repercussions away for later.

**ooooo**

Jac pulls up in a deserted car park and cuts the engine. She surveys the scene before her with a critical eye; It's a large reservoir on the outskirts of Holby, and it had sprung to mind simply because of a BBC news article about green-blue algae she'd skimmed past a few days ago. It isn't the scene she imagined. The odd dog walker strolls past, hands stuffed in their pockets and misery at the cold contorting their determined faces. A few hundred metres away a group of school children are being subjected to a canoeing lesson, and she can just make out their excitable screeches and splashing. She sighs and climbs out of the car, then parks herself on the table of a picnic bench a few feet from the water's edge. She closes her eyes and tries to concentrate, stilling herself and letting the waves of cold wash over her. She's exhausted, and strongly suspecting herself of insanity, but she hadn't been able to sleep at all after last night's disturbance and she fears she won't until she gets to the bottom of all this. The problem is, she has no idea how to do that. She tries to listen to the water lapping against the shore, because that has to be significant, but she can only hear the splashes and the laughter from the children, who are paddling closer. She opens her eyes again and looks over to them.

_The image is a child's face. It's a wide eyed look of terror, a look that should never have to cross the features of one so young. It's a white face, with parted blue lips, and jet black hair that floats around it like a halo, untamed by gravity. It's submerged in the water, where there's no sound and nobody's breathing. Then somebody's telling her to breathe._

Jac gasps, yelps almost, then looks away from the group of children and has to shut her eyes tight to banish the image. It's impressed onto the back of her eyelids though, too, and it makes her want to cry. Her hands cradle her bump and her child wriggles energetically inside her, sensing the distress. "It's okay baby." She manages, in that soft whisper she saves only for it. "Sorry." She concentrates, probably pointlessly, on rubbing circles and shushing her unborn child. Perhaps just to take her mind off the unnerving image. She wonders if her baby feels the cold like she does, and she hopes not. The cold comes from within, and it feels like it's taking over her body. Soon it'll reach to the tips of her toes and she'll be frozen to this bench forever. Stuck in time.

_The image is of the sky. The brilliant white sky that looks blue and and green and purple and mottled in confusion as she blinks. She's cold. She's so cold and the sky is the least comforting thing in the world with all is bracing infinity. She's stiff and her body is jerking around out of her control and she's breathing but only because they tell her too. She's so cold she thinks she might forget otherwise. There's shouting, and a glimpse of something silver and reflective. She doesn't know where it's come from or why it's pinning her down on the ground._

Jac frowns. Some things seem clearer, some things seem further away. She knows that something happened, and she knows it was her fault. She hops off the bench and walks closer to the water's edge.

_The image is of the black hole in the shiny lake surface that blends into the frosty grass like a cruel trick. It's flying towards her as she skates out to it, slipping and sliding and crashing through thin ice. Her feet are numb already but she fights forward and shrieks for help and only when she falls down through the shattered surface and she can't touch the bottom anymore does the world stop turning. She has a job to do. She has a life to save. The icy water rips at her skin and paralyses her struggle. It doesn't feel cold anymore because it's engulfed her every pore and there's nothing else to compare it to. It's all there is._

Jac lets out a soft choke of surprise and lets her legs give way beneath her, sitting down hard on the ground. It was real. It was her fault. It's all painted across her mind in technicolour now, every last awful second. She brings a hand up to her face and squeezes her eyes shut. "I can't do this." She whispers to her bump. "I'm sorry. I can't." She's breathing heavily as she scrambles back onto her feet and makes a beeline for the car. Suddenly she needs to be as far away from the reservoir, from the icy water, as she possibly can be.

Inside the car she whacks the heating up to max and pulls away in a hurry. The warm, dry air evaporates her tears and makes her eyes feel sticky and hot. She tries to steady her breathing as she heads back towards the centre of Holby, cruising up the A38 and forcing herself to concentrate on the road. She pushes her thoughts of the past to the deepest recesses of her mind, wishing she could just banish them again and not remember. But now she knows and there's no turning back. What ever possessed her to buy into this fairytale? Why did she ever think she could be a mother? She closes her eyes for a split second and there's a loud clunk from somewhere inside the car. It startles her heart into her throat and she slows her speed, glancing around for some indication of the root of the noise. It happens again, twice in quick succession, and she holds her breath. She's not too far from the city now and she makes the snap decision to keep going, just as the engine chokes at her defiantly and she's forced to coast to a standstill half on the verge. She rests her head on her hands for a minute; This would have to happen now, just when the last thing she needs is further time alone with her inadequacies. She knows Jonny will have a field day when he finds out.

She allows herself a quick sulk before fumbling in her bag for her phone, only to be further irked when she finds there's no signal. She glances to her left and eyes up the tall grassy verge. She's tired, and she's not really wearing the footwear for this, but nevertheless she climbs out from behind the wheel with the determination to prove to herself that she's as strong and independent as she ever has been. Jac takes approximately three steps up the sodden, uneven verge before she turns her ankle in a hidden rabbit hole and crumples down onto the muddy grass with a yelp. She lands on her left side, and it's a searing pain across her shoulder that causes her to call out. She rolls urgently onto her back and gingerly clutches her arm, and the movement sends fresh shooting pains right to her fingertips, confirming her suspicions. "Fuck!" She exclaims at a roar.

"You alright, love?" She hadn't noticed the second car that's pulled up behind hers until now, and she looks over at the source of the voice and sighs. A baby faced Community Support Officer stands a few metres away from her, fiddling with his hat and staring at her with wide eyed trepidation.

"What does it look like?" She barks, thankful that this man is obligated to help her out, which at least lessons the possibility that she'll scare him away or piss him off enough to abandon her. A second Officer climbs out of the car and stalks straight up to her. He looks far more weathered than the first, and he crouches next to Jac with a hint of a smile on his face.

"Well well well. This is a new one on me. Hi love, my name's Paul. Are you going to tell me how exactly you got yourself in this little situation here?" Jac lets her head fall back against the grass, mortified. She's covered in mud, and pinned to the ground by the pain from moving and the weight of her bulging abdomen. She huffs and pouts at the man, who chuckles gently as he slides his arm underneath her and helps her sit. "Don't worry. You're lucky we were passing."

"Lucky?" She questions, unconvinced. She can think of luckier turns of events than finding herself beached on a grass verge by a busy A road with mud in her hair and an audience.

"Okay love." He takes pity on her wretched grimace as she holds her arm. "Why don't you let me drive you to the hospital? Dave here," he indicates the young one, "can wait for the AA."


	2. Chapter 2

**The Secret.**

**Ooh thankyou for your reviews! Here's the 2nd & last bit, a muddled sort of twizzly finale. Let me know what you think! XX Sarah**

Jonny is beginning to feel as if he's wasting his time. The rage he'd felt when he commandeered Jac's bike and started to comb the streets at speed is starting to dissolve into something more rational as time passes and he remains unsuccessful. His arms are starting to ache and his feet are going numb, and he'd forgotten how sodding freezing the bike would be in this weather. His earlier aggression may have led to a few road laws being broken, too, and he's starting to dread Jac's reaction when a speeding ticket lands on her doorstep. Now he doesn't even know where he is, and he's about to just turn around and head back to somewhere he recognises when he spots the hazard lights up ahead, and the familiar vehicle that's responsible. He touches on the accelerator as he approaches, his heart suddenly in his throat. The scene appears deserted, save for a Community Support Officer who's standing by the car shivering and frantically smoking. She would go into an early labour on her own beside a remote A road. She just would.

"What's happened?" He shouts the words as he pulls up, wrenches off the helmet and runs towards the man. "Where is she?" The young man frowns, he's devoid of Jonny's urgency.

"You shouldn't wear jeans on a bike like that, mate." Jonny glares at him.

"Where's the woman who was with this car?" He speaks slowly and loudly. "Is she having the baby?" The young man looks confused again, and now Jonny's hoping that she is in labour because his mind is starting to conjure up all sorts of awful alternatives from kidnapping to getting herself arrested.

"Well I guess so, yeah. Probably not today though. Bump's not dropped yet, you see," He starts to mime this out to Jonny, still clutching his fag and holding his hands out to demonstrate his expert knowledge on the matter, which is based solely on the recent arrival of his niece. Jonny cuts him off with a face like thunder.

"Where the hell is she?!"

"Okay mate!" He holds his hands up in defence now. "She slipped on the grass as we were passing. She's hurt her arm." He shrugs. "Paul's taken her to Casualty, and left me on this bleeding roadside." It's all Jonny needs and he darts back to the bike, missing Dave's face light up as an AA van pulls up behind them.

**ooooo**

"Sacha!" He tries to dart away out of view as his F1 shouts for him across the busy ward, but he's always been hopeless at being inconspicuous.

"2 minutes Gemma, I'm busy."

"Well, you're going to have to be un-busy." She looks hassled and he relents, holding out his hand for the set of notes she chucks to him. "Anterior shoulder dislocation sent up from the ED. She's refusing pain medication and generally living up to her reputation. I am so not getting paid enough to deal with that." She holds her hands up in the air and Sacha sighs as he reads the name on the file.

"Jac." He abandons his current task to Gemma and heads to the side room. She looks up accusingly as he enters, but her face softens a little when she sees it's him. She's shaking, writhing in pain on the bed, and she looks so forlorn there on her own it melts his heart. "What happened?" He starts gently, perching beside her and examining the injury, concerned by the blueish hue to her fingers.

"I fell over." She snaps, and he frowns in confusion as he notices her muddy attire. She cries out with a fresh wave of agony as he touches her shoulder, shrinking down further onto the bed and giving him the urge to scold her.

"For god's sake, why didn't you let the ED give you any analgesics?"

"Why do you think?" She breathes in a wobbly voice, her good hand on her bump, eyes squeezed shut against the pain now and face drained of colour. "I can handle it."

"No you can't. The muscles are in spasm, I can't attempt a reduction unless I sedate you. Soon. Because the way those fingers look we'll be talking surgery before too long. I take it you haven't had an x-ray?" She shakes her head and he puts his hands on his hips.

"Please Sacha." Her voice is small, begging, and it dawns on him that she's manipulated her way upstairs and onto this ward to be treated by somebody she trusts. He reaches out instinctively to stroke her hair, because she looks so small and vulnerable when there's fear in her eyes.

"Alright." He replies gently. "But I'm giving you a low dose of Ketamine first. No arguments." Then, "It'll be fine, okay?" When she looks conflicted at the idea. He calls out onto the ward for Gemma, and the F1 returns tentatively with the drug, eyeing the ferocious patient who, thankfully, seems to have relaxed in Sacha's presence.

"How're you feeling?" She tries innocently, receiving only a glare in return. Sacha administers the injection and Jac barely reacts, then slowly relaxes and lets him take her arm whilst the F1 moves to her other side, handing her an oxygen mask and instinctively taking her hand. She regrets that move as soon as Sacha starts to manipulate the limb under the minimal anaesthetic, and Jac is bone crushing to the point where it's Gemma who squeaks in pain with the movements. Both women screech as there's a satisfying crack and Sacha looks pleased with himself. Jac flops back down against the bed, breathless from the shock and still shaking a little.

"Right, half hourly obs please Dr Wilde. And page me if these don't pink up again in the next ten minutes." Sacha indicates her fingers as he places the arm gently into a sling.

"I can do that." Jac replies softly, mortified all over again now that the panic's gone. She swats the F1 away as the girl starts to prod her blueish fingers.

"You," Sacha scorns, "will be sparko in three."

"Don't be ridiculous." Jac murmurs, already sinking back into the pillows and letting her eyelids droop.

**ooooo**

Jonny storms up to the desk on AAU, already fuming again, fuelled by a security guard who'd told him not to run in the hospital. He'd had to wait nearly half an hour in the ED before somebody worked out she'd been transferred up here. Now he knows where she is and the scene at the desk baffles him; Sacha and Gemma are giggling amiably over something as the girl proffers her hand out to her boss and he pats it mockingly. If Jac's been admitted he doesn't understand what they could possibly be finding so funny.

"Jonny!" She spots him first. "We were just talking about you." She has the audacity to be smirking.

"Where is she?" He barks, and Sacha comes out from behind the desk with sympathetic eyes, recognising panic when he sees it.

"She's fine. Absolutely fine, I treated her myself. She dislocated her shoulder and I'll dare say she's bruised her ego a bit too."

"Where is she?" He repeats his earlier question more calmly.

"In the side room." Jonny frowns, because that doesn't sound like 'fine'.

"Don't worry," Gemma pipes up again as she spots his concern, "She fell asleep and Dr Levy here is a soppy git who can't bear to wake her up, even though we need the bed." Sacha confirms this with a nod and a shrug. "By the way," she continues as he heads off to find her, "she tried to crush me during the reduction." Gemma shows him a bruised wrist. "When the big day comes, you give that woman an epidural if you want to live." She winks at him and he smiles, lightened by the mood.

Jonny creeps into the side room and places the helmet on a chair. Sacha's right, she's in a deep slumber and she looks adorable. She's easy to love when she's asleep. He takes a seat on the side of the bed and strokes her hair, making her stir a little.

"I'm sorry." It's a soft whisper from the bed, and he barely hears it.

"It's fine." He speaks, then frowns when she doesn't open her eyes at his words.

"I'm sorry I'm sorry. No. Sorry. No no no." His lips part a little as he realises she's still asleep. Her face contorts in anguish at his touch, and a few tears slip down her cheeks as her eyes squeeze tightly shut. She's having a nightmare.

"Jac." He tries more forcefully and she wakes with a start, blinking and orientating herself. She doesn't say anything as she looks up at him, her face unreadable. "You're crying." He states, confused if anything, and she brushes her cheeks self consciously. "Talk to me."

"Let's go. They'll need the bed." She shifts away from him and tries to force herself up, but the bed's flat and with only one arm and her baby's weight to contend with she only manages a few inches of up before yelping from the pain in her shoulder and flopping back down again. She frowns, infuriated. "Help me up."

"No. Just, talk to me." Her eyes gloss over and he wonders if he's just put the final nail in their tentative civility.

"You love it, don't you." She spits, using anger to veil her upset.

"Love what?" He groans in response, so sick of this game.

"Suffocating me. Controlling me." His eyes flash towards her, and he looks angrier than she's ever seen him before.

"No. No Jac, I do not love that the only way I can get more than two words out of the mother of my child is by physical entrapment." The air is thick with his venomous words. "Or, apparently not even then." He adds when she remains mute.

"I can't." She whispers. "I can't."

"Yes you can, why the hell not?" He doesn't relent. "It's putting words together, one after the other. You do it every damn day."

Her face changes at his words. She understands why he's so upset, and that she hasn't considered him at all. She's spent months trying to get used to considering her baby and in all the emotional upheaval the thought of there being a third person in the fray as well has just been easier to ignore. She's never trusted herself to have responsibility over other people. She's never been any good at it at all. Her vision clouds with tears and she struggles her way more forcefully up off the bed. She exclaims in raw frustration at how hard the motion is, the pain in her shoulder brings a fresh sob to her lips. Then his arms envelop her and helps her up, he drags her into his chest where she can bury her face away from his eyes and cry into his body as he holds her. He always will, because he knows how to look after people, even her, even when she's being a first class bitch.

"I can't. I mean, I can't do this." He holds her tightly, taken aback by the revelation of her fears.

"Yes, you can." He whispers again softly, the meaning clear now, and his sentiment equally so. "We can."

"You don't understand."

"Let me try." She's silent, but the tears have abated and she appears to be thinking carefully. "Okay," he continues when she doesn't respond. "Let me take you home. Get you something to eat, and some fresh clothes." He feels the mud that's caked to the back of her jumper as he speaks. She doesn't exactly nod, but she looks up at him in acceptance, resigned to the idea for the sake of her aching body.

**ooooo**

Jac pads sheepishly into her living room, getting Jonny's attention with her subdued manner. She's wearing sweats, holding the hoody around herself where she can't zip it with one hand, clutching a towel and a bottle of shampoo. He turns to face her and smiles; She's hating every minute of this.

"How much does it hurt?"

"It's fine. It's tolerable."

"You should have taken the Morphine." He sounds chiding, as bad as Sacha, and she shakes her head.

"My stupid accident, my problem." She means her pain to deal with, her instinct to protect the baby from unnecessary risk.

"Right." He answers flatly, because there's really no point in arguing when she's made her mind up. She doesn't move, and he looks at her questioningly.

"Help, then!" She hisses eventually, making him laugh. He almost skips across the room to her side, and diligently zips up the hoody, protecting her modesty.

"Is this Elliot's?" His voice is still laced with annoying amusement.

"Mine doesn't fit." She snaps in irritation. The sentiment is truer than ever now he's trying to squeeze her, the bump, and her injured arm underneath the fabric with difficulty. After his morning of panic he can't deny that he's a little pleased to see her mortified and fuming at him; Perhaps this will be a lesson learnt.

"Anything else?" He asks innocently, eyeing the shampoo and her still muddy hair. Her jaw is set and he's waiting for her to explode and call him an infantile waste of space, so he's surprised when her features drop and she's awash with a fresh wave of hormonal tears.

"Stop it." She mutters childishly. "You know there is, you could just help me."

"Oh hey, come on." He puts an arm around her that she shrugs away painfully. "Of course I'll help you, you silly mare. You know I will."

"You have to just do it, Jonny. You can't play stupid games like this." He looks at her like she's cracked. Gentle teasing and sarcasm are at the root of most conversations they have, and even with her hormones on overdrive he doesn't understand why she's taking offence now.

"Give a guy a break." He keeps his tone light. "I have to keep that lofty air of mystery alive, you know, otherwise the girls get bored."

"Not with a baby." She states through tears. "You have to be there all the time, Jonny. No games. No getting preoccupied." She reiterates, as if she's introducing him to the notion of fatherhood for the first time. He's no less confused.

"Yes, I know not with a baby. What'd you think I'd do, not change its nappy till it sits up and asks me to?" She sobs harder into her good hand, the rest of her still bundled into the jumper. She looks ridiculous. "Jac, what has got into you?!" They're wretched girlie tears, and he banks on her irrational behaviour being due to hormones. He sighs and guides her to the bathroom with a firm hand. There's a thick inky silence between them as he drags a stool in front of the sink and sits her down, puts the towel around her shoulders and drags her hair carefully into the basin. She looks up at him with red rimmed eyes, the trust slowly budding again. Then, out of nowhere, she starts to talk.

"A girl died. A six year old girl, in my care. It was my fault." He freezes for a second, his hands unmoving in the sink as her submerged locks slip away between his fingers in slow motion.

**ooooo**

There's a slap, a crack that stills the argument momentarily. Jac grits her teeth and ignores the sting of tears, she won't give the bitch the satisfaction of a reaction.

"Just do as you're bleeding told." The woman growls the words at her, and they square up to one another; They're the same height. "I need some fags. I'll be ten minutes." Jac's still quiet, her blood boiling irrationally as she tries not to fall into the inevitable trap of their worn out brawl, but it rolls out like clockwork anyway.

"You want some fags. When the hell do I get what I want?" She snaps defiantly, almost earning herself another slap. She doesn't care, her cheek's still smarting from the first.

"You've a roof over your head you ungrateful girl. That's more than some." There it is. She's not allowed to complain because she's not the worst off person in the world. She never has anything to say to that because it's true, and self indulgence makes her sick. She folds her arms and sets her features into a dark scowl, willing the stinging sensation away from her cheek and watching her foster Mother stalk out of the park gate and disappear from view. The anger in her gut keeps boiling; She hates being told what to do. It leaves her aching with coiled frustration far more than any physical wound would. The first twelve years of her life had been so utterly devoid of discipline that her thirteenth has slapped her in the face with an unimaginable level of anger and conflict. A whole great book of rules and regulations that make her want to scoff and scream all at once. She turns on her heel and surveys the three kids that she's been left to guard with narrow eyes. Her skin prickles as little Ellie, doe eyed dark haired little Ellie, grabs a fist full of Jac's jeans and tugs to get her attention. This mismatched gaggle of unwanted mongrels are well versed in turning to the tallest person around for answers. Well versed in abandonment, that is. Jac's dark expression doesn't falter.

"Jacky." Ellie whines, holding her pale, chubby arms up towards the thirteen year old, who to her appears as an adult.

"No!" She shouts, and the child's face falls. "That's not my name. Just fuck off!" The child starts to cry. Big, fat, shameless tears that give Jac some sort of cathartic release, as if she can feel this honest kind of anguish through a six year old whilst her own guard remains intact. She turns her back on the responsibility with a determined defiance, and stalks off in search of solitude.

Away from the picnic benches and through a gap in a line of trees, there's a deserted fishing lake and the air is still. The dense conifers muffle the noise from the park, the sound of tears that are contagious amongst the young ones. Jac squeezes her eyes tightly shut and wipes away the stray ones from her own cheeks. She will not cry. Nobody will see her cry. To counteract the wave of weakness she picks up a stone from near her feet and launches it with an angry exhale. It hits the lake surface a few metres away, makes the smallest of chips in the ice, then skids out towards the middle and comes to a forlorn standstill. She glares at it, because that's just perfect. That says it all; A dark black speck on a huge white canvas that, try as it might, has made no impact at all. Her gaze drops to the shore, just near her feet, and she gasps and steps back as she sees the shapes moving beneath the ice. She squints at them and peers closer, then smiles. They're fish! She gets onto her hands and knees for a better look, transfixed by the idea of a whole world of activity beneath this barren, impenetrable surface. She shivers as her jeans get wet, but closes her eyes and breathes calmly. She's alone, this moment is hers, in this scene she can be whoever she wants to be.

Jac's reverie is punctured by a strange noise. Her gaze snaps up, out, over the lake and she exclaims aloud in confusion as she tries to make sense of what's before her. The child is making a beeline for the abandoned stone. She's not supposed to be here, she's supposed to be by the benches with the others. Why the hell is she here? The child slips on the ice and squeaks in shock. Jac leaps back onto her feet. Her legs are numb, they're made of lead. The crack in the ice echoes and reverberates, she can feel it in her bones. She can see what's happening, and it shouldn't be happening. The scream that echoes in her ears doesn't feel like it's her own. "Ellie!" Then the scene starts to move. The child has vanished, she's plunged through the surface into the world beneath it, and Jac scrambles dizzily in her wake. Every step is a setback, every movement creates more destruction. She's nearly there when she falls through the surface. Her legs are already useless, like blocks of ice tethered to her waist, and the rest of her limbs follow suit as she struggles urgently. She can see Ellie's face. She can see the parted lips and the wide eyes, but her own body doesn't work anymore. Her muscles are made of rock, and this new world is dark, darker than before. She needs to go back. She needs to go to a time, so unimaginable now, where the cold wasn't the only conscious thought.

_The image is of the sky. The brilliant white sky that looks blue and and green and purple and mottled in confusion as she blinks. She's cold. She's so cold and the sky is the least comforting thing in the world with all is bracing infinity. She's stiff and her body is jerking around out of her control and she's breathing but only because they tell her too. She's so cold she thinks she might forget otherwise. There's shouting, and a glimpse of something silver and reflective. She doesn't know where it's come from or why it's pinning her down on the ground. She doesn't know anything._

**ooooo**

"You don't have to tell me." Jonny punctures a lengthy silence with his words, and they catch Jac off guard. He sounds sort of resigned to her secrecy, and she gets a pang of something she doesn't recognise as she registers the way he's carefully massaging conditioner through her hair.

"Mmm." She makes the noise involuntarily, surprising herself, and he seems pleased at the reaction. "It's not that I don't want to."

"But I won't understand." It's the same hurt tone as before and it makes her feel guilty.

"You can't." She tries carefully. "I don't." It's true, her feelings are in knots at the moment. Some days she doesn't know whether she's on the edge of laughing or crying, just that she's constantly on the edge of something. Now, when she closes her eyes all she can see is Ellie's face and all she can feel is the weighty guilt and all she knows is how abruptly unfinished the story is. There was delirium, and hypothermia, and after that she never saw the family again.

"You could try me." He continues with a shrug, twisting the moisture from her hair and encouraging her to sit up a little with a coaxing hand. She sighs.

"I'd forgotten. I was thirteen. I can't believe I'd forgotten." He winds the towel around her head and gestures for her to stand, an arm around her waist to protect her from dizziness or unbalance.

"You were thirteen, when this girl died?" He asks softly.

"Yes." She doesn't understand the relevance, why he's not curious about the circumstances instead.

"That must have been tough." She shrugs.

"I don't know. It was my fault." She's wondering if he'll take the bait, demand the story, then he'll see that bit of evil inside her again and their equilibrium will be rebalanced back to something she understands. She feels less emotionally unstable if she can rely on his hatred. He looks at her strangely, and she feels like she's being analysed so she looks away.

"Don't be a martyr Jac. Jesus, it doesn't suit you. It never has." He uses the word 'never' with such an infinity that it makes her wonder how he came to know her so well. She ponders how he slipped in through the gates untraced. It's caught her off guard, and she lets him guide her through to the living room without protest.

Jonny's eyes are trained carefully on Jac. He's consistently unnerved by how much she needs looking after, despite his willingness to oblige. Mo finds the idea scornful. She's a broken record with all her bitter proclamations that Jac has him right where she wants him; Worried and obedient. Mo doesn't know her like he does. Mo wasn't there on the fire escape, right at the beginning, when she'd confessed her fear to him in a secretive whisper. Mo wasn't there when the morning sickness had far exceeded its welcome and she'd crawled into bed for a whole weekend of exhaustion. Mo wasn't there at the scan when he'd boldly announced they should keep the gender a surprise and she, in a departure from her usual rationale, had nodded in agreement and they'd shared a snatch of a connection. Mo wasn't there when she really did manage to contract food poisoning and her pallor had far exceeded that of her sickness because she was so horrified that she'd made a mistake. Mo isn't here now. Mo can't see the depth behind those eyes.

When he first got to know her he thought he understood; She's closed off. She has barriers, defences, a web of untruths to hide behind. These past few months have altered that analysis more deeply than he could have imagined. There are no lies. In fact, he's seen her try to fib and she's as transparent as a toddler. She's been closed off because she doesn't have anything to share, and that's what scares her most. She doesn't avoid falling in love, or opening herself up, she just doesn't know how to. She doesn't strive to protect her reputation, one that's scarred with gossip and mistrust anyway, she only strives to protect her patients. This pregnancy appears to stir feelings in her that have previously lain unreachable, and she's one volatile chemical reaction away from completeness or collapse.

Jonny sits down on the sofa and draws her body into his, leaning back and letting her conceal a whimper as he nudges her shoulder accidently. He smirks to himself as she lays against him and he can watch the steady rise and fall of her chest; He loves that his presence can have this relaxing effect on her. It won't last, because her head is far more complicated than that and it's probably already off, racing to places he doesn't have the directions for. But, perhaps they can just spend the afternoon in each other's arms, sleeping off the adrenaline together.

"Jonny?" She whispers, her eyes closed.

"Mmm?"

"Why the hell is my helmet on the coffee table?"


End file.
